The Great and Powerful Rynar Hibiki, Planet-Hopping Part-Timer
by springofdrownednerd
Summary: A wandering oddjob who probably thinks too much of himself jumps around the galaxy. Outrunning thieves, bounty hunters, murderers, and even the New Republic, he's just trying to make a living.
1. Chapter 1

The Great and Powerful Rynar Hibiki, Planet-Hopping Part Timer

Chapter 1

 _Well._

 _That went to shit faster than I expected._

Rynar Hibiki hunkered down behind a particularly sturdy-looking plasteel crate, an inkling of regret for the actions leading to his current situation beginning to form in the back of his mind.

Then again, that could just be his lunch coming back with a vengeance. Damned Mon Calamari street vendors and their deliciously fried seaweed wraps. Heartburn, all wrapped up and ready for your overpriced consumption.

But back to the now, and the blaster bolts angrily melting their way through his impromptu cover.

Rynar risked a glance around the side of the crate, and was able to just make out the shape of his blaster pistol laying a meter or so off to his right, exactly where he had planned for it to land when the punch he had _totally_ expected had connected with his face and sent him sprawling.

In that split second, he was also able to discern the positions of his aggressors, a pair of Rodians and a Human, the former taking cover behind the short durasteel crate atop which still sat the object that had brought the four of them together, and the latter poking his shiny bald head out from behind another, larger crate to his left and looking suspiciously like he was about try some sort of flanking maneuver.

Pulling himself back to avoid the worryingly well-aimed group of shots from the two Rodians just before they ionized the air where his head would have been, he reached back into the belt pouch on his left side and pulled out the rather expensive little surprise he had purchased for just such an occasion as this.

Because, clearly, he had planned for this eventuality. This wasn't just left-over equipment from that job on Sullust a few months back.

He grasped the handle-like grip of the Merr-Sonn C-14A Stun Grenade, thumbed the activator, and lobbed the bulky device up and over the top of his rapidly-melting crate, then quickly brought his hands up to his ears and squeezed his eyes shut. A brief second later he _felt_ , rather than heard, the sound of the non-lethal energy weapon, and snapped his eyes open and sprang into a dive across the meter of open ground, wrapping his hand around his modified Merr-Sonn Model 434 heavy blaster pistol.

The dive became a roll, and he righted himself and spun to snap his aim at the nearest of the Rodians, the "DeathHammer" living up to its colloquial nickname as his first shot burned clean through the alien's torso.

The next Rodian had apparently had the sense to try and duck behind his cover at the sight of the stun grenade, though likely to marginally less effect that he had hoped, and the next shot incinerated a third of his green-skinned skull and at least one of his three eyes.

The human hadn't been so lucky, and was currently on his knees clutching his eyes and cursing in some language Rynar didn't understand.

It was the inflection. It doesn't matter what language you speak, pissed is pissed.

Rynar levelled his blaster at the man, but paused, rubbing his freshly-bruised chin in thought. This was, after all, the man who had _given_ him that bruise and started the, admittedly short, firefight. It wasn't his fault the man was so sensitive about the light reflecting off his head.

Seriously, who actually waxes their head?

What to do, though? He had definite cause to just shoot the guy, especially considering the rather painful bruise he could feel heating up his lower jaw- damn, was it starting to swell?- but, at the same time, he was now clearly just a helpless noncombatant. So long as he didn't actually manage to level his now-rising blaster at Rynar-

That thought snapped the wandering oddjob's mind back to reality, and his finger back to the trigger. An instant later, the man was dead.

 _Well, I guess that solves that problem._

Confident he was now alone and unwatched, he sighed and holstered his somewhat-bulky sidearm with a flip and a flourish, _just in case,_ and turned to regard the object of contention that had brought the four, now one, to the small, isolated warehouse in the first place. Sitting on the crate was a metallic black cylinder, about half a meter long, with a holographic keypad interface set into the top. Hibiki strode over to the crate and lifted the device, or… container… whatever it was, and gave it an appraising once-over before shrugging and hooking it to his belt.

 _Suppose I'll have to return this, then. Shame about that seller's fee, though._

A thought struck him, then, as he remembered the terms of the deal, discussed beforehand. The three thugs he'd been instructed to meet for the handoff were supposed to have been paying in physical credit chits rather than direct transference of funds. He hopped over the crate and searched what remained of the body of the first Rodian he'd shot, finding a pair of the ubiquitous energy cells used in weapons across the galaxy and a few small-denomination credit chits, but nothing else worth taking. He inspected the alien's dropped weapon, a well-used BlasTech DT-12, but discarded it due to its overly bulky grip.

Leaving the heavy pistol to clatter to the ground somewhere off in the shadows, he moved to the still-smoking body of the second Rodian. A quick search turned turned up a rather hefty pouch stashed in the thug's pockets, along with another pair of energy cells and a few packaged human hard candies, the sugary kind that the reptilian sentients seemed to love so much. Rynar unwrapped one of the little red candies, popped it in his mouth, and opened the pouch to find a modest collection of five-thousand-credit chits within.

 _Seventy-five thousand? Damn, whatever this thing is must be pretty valuable._

Without another thought, Rynar pocketed the pouch and crouched over the human, having ignored the weapon of the second Rodian as it was identical to the first. Half of the man's throat had been burned away by the high-powered energy weapon, leaving the man with a wide-eyed, surprised look on his face as he leaned back against the crate he'd been using as cover. Initial inspections didn't turn up anything worth swiping, and the idea of toting around the man's dropped blaster rifle didn't appeal to the young wanderer, compact though it may be, it was still larger than he could easily conceal on his person and likely wouldn't be worth enough to justify the effort.

Taking one last look around the warehouse, Rynar retrieved the rechargeable C-14A stun grenade and strode out of the room and back onto the dusty streets of Ord Mantell City.

* * *

"You _shot_ them?"

"Yep."

" _All of them?"_

"Yeah."

" _You killed my buyers?"_

"I honestly don't see what's so hard to understand."

Rynar stood just inside the doors to the backroom of the _Broken Circuit_ , a private, made-to-order electronics shop specializing in black market weapons fabrication and modification, walls lined with starship and weapon parts, and even a few unarmed proton torpedoes, leaning back against the doorframe as the irate Sullustan engineer before him turned a shade of red he hadn't thought the somewhat diminutive alien capable of achieving.

"I understand that you _shot_ them, what I don't understand is _why._ "

Rynar shrugged.

"One of them punched me, so I punched back. Then the other two drew their blasters and I drew mine, and it pretty much went downhill from there. Scored a few candies off one of the Rodians, though-"

At that the Sullustan's composure finally broke.

"I hired you to deliver a package to a man two blocks away! It was the simplest thing in the world, and you screwed it up! The only reason I hired you at all was to add an extra degree of separation between myself and my buyers to keep the feds and the Black Sun off my ass, and you couldn't even handle that-"

"I still got the cash."

"And to top it off, now I have _three_ bodies to deal with, and you… you what?"

"I got the cash. One of the Rodians had it." Rynar withdrew the pouch and held it before the engineer. "How much were they supposed to be giving you?'

"One hundred and fifty thousand credits, cash, in five-thousand credit chits." The Sullustan responded, taking the proffered bag and rifling through it. "There's only sixty-thousand in here! Hand over the rest!" he commanded, accusingly.

"I don't have any more, it's all in there." Technically true, Rynar had taken a detour to pay the dockmaster to refuel his ship and stash the rest onboard. He really didn't have any cash on his person. "You already paid me and you promised me hazard pay if it went to shit, so why would I do something so obviously stupid?"

"Bah, 'hazard pay.' You Humans, always screwing up and wanting someone else to pay you to make you feel better…" his grumbling trailed off as he shuffled a few things around on the floor and opened up a small safe. Withdrawing the contents, he all but threw them at the young man in front of him, not even bothering to turn around as he did so. "Go on, take it, leave the package on the table, and get out of here. See if I hire you again after a job like that."

"Well, thank you so much for that fantastic endorsement, sir, and I wish you the best of luck in your endeavors, legal or otherwise." Counting out his "hazard pay," _Five thousand? Cheap bastard,_ Hibiki turned to leave, stopping before he opened the door.

"Hey, what the hell was that thing, anyway?"

"Not that it's any of your business, but it's a high-capacity, high-output hyperdrive energy converter. It can bank twice as much power as the regular converters and funnel it into the drive at double the rate, allowing for faster and smoother jumps. Not that I've had much chance to test it, seeing as every lowlife in the city wants to get their hands on it."

There was a metallic thud and a faint hissing sound as the door closed behind the departing Hibiki, and the Sullustan sighed in relief, reaching over to the table to grab and inspect his creation for any damage it may have incurred in the hands of the incompetent man he'd hired.

Immediately, he noticed the difference. The cylinder was too thick, and the holographic interface was absent. Jerking his head around, he realized why.

While he'd been paying the man, Hibiki had pulled one of the unarmed proton torpedoes off of the wall and placed it on the table to distract him while he left with the device.

The engineer ran for the door, his commlink live in his hands, connecting to a Black Suns contact as he sprinted through the shop proper and out onto the streets, turning frantically as he searched the busy streets for signs of the thieving scoundrel.

Rynar Hibiki was lost in the crowds.

* * *

Rynar Hibiki was lost in the crowds.

 _Dammit, I should have paid more attention to the map at the spaceport._

Standing half a head shorter than the average human, Hibiki dodged and weaved his way around the various sapients meandering through the busy streets of Ord Mantell, periodically jumping in an attempt to see over the heads of the crowd and get some sense of where he was to orient himself back to his ship. Catching sight of the bright sign of the shipwright a few blocks to his left, he ducked back down into the crowd, picking up the pace to lose the tail he'd spotted coming from the right.

 _Gotta be Black Sun. Have to hand it to him, they got here FAST. I guess anyone willing to make a sale like that in a run-down warehouse must have_ some _sort of pull with the local crime syndicates._

Distracted as he was, Rynar barely had time to duck as a large, hairy fist rushed through the air. Scrambling upright, he turned his head to see something that, in retrospect, he probably should have noticed earlier. The hulking, grey-brown form of a Whipid muscled its way through the crowd, its enormous jowls pulled back in a snarl as it bared its impressive tusks, thundering after him. At least, Rynar thought it was a snarl. It was so hard to tell with some aliens.

Then again, pissed is pissed.

As he neared the shipyards, the crowd thinned a bit and he broke into a run, making a beeline for dock seven and his own craft, the Whipid's thundering footfalls keeping him well informed of exactly how close to serious injury he was at all times. Weaving around humans and aliens alike, he rounded the corner of his dock, his ship coming into sight through the crowd.

The _Nomad's Bluff_ sat between a pair of larger ships, a freighter and a commercial passenger liner, both in better repair than the rough-looking Corellian VCX-820 freighter. A typically-Corellian half-dome cockpit sat between a pair of metallic "wings" that swept five meters back and another fifteen forward, connecting behind the cockpit in a rounded body that harkened back to the ship's Imperial heritage.

Or would, if the majority of the black and silver paint on the craft hadn't been scratched, scorched, scuffed, or seared off over the years in any number of encounters, excursions, events, or exploratory missions. As she sat, the majority of the panels that hadn't been welded, beaten, or outright replaced carried little in the way of paint save the durable, white primer the Empire used on everything from spacecraft to Stormtrooper armor, and even that was so faded and scratched that it appeared a mere dull gray from a distance.

As he came within a few meters of the ship's bow, he ducked beneath the port canard and made a beeline for the loading ramp, withdrawing a small yellow remote from his inner jacket pocket and depressing one of the buttons on its widest face. Ports on the underside of the _Nomad's Bluff_ hissed as the airlocks equalized the pressure of the ship's interior with Ord Mantell's atmosphere, and the loading ramp slid open, touching down just as Hibiki reached it. His heavy boots thundered up the ramp and he paused, turning to face his pursuer. The Whipid was emerging from ducking beneath the port canard he had passed only seconds before and glared at the thief with what he presumed to be rage.

A crooked smile, half formed, made its way across his face as his left hand found a control panel and the ramp began to retract.

"Better luck next ti-" he began, turning to jog around the corner into the cockpit. A loud **thud** followed by the whine of struggling hydraulics grabbed his attention, and he spun to see the snarling, hairy form of the Whipid, one foot on the edge of the ramp and the other inside with both hands braced against the ceiling, fluid leaking from the patchwork hydraulic lines running along the walls, forcing his way into the ship and preventing the ramp from closing.

Rynar fumbled with his blaster, attempting to draw it from his holster. "Damn," he cursed at the offending blaster as the top-mounted scope caught on the old, worn holster.

If anyone asked him later what motivated his next action, Rynar Hibiki would tell them that he carefully considered all possible options and, of all the choices, this one had the highest probability of success with the lowest possible chance of risk to himself. It was a well-thought-out plan and he was completely confident in its success.

"Uh, wait, no, um…" he stuttered, his mind completely void of ideas, "we can, uh, maybe, work this out, or…"

A single thought entered his brain, but the soulless vacuum of the human mind forced it from inception to expulsion more quickly than usual, bypassing the critical "processing and consideration" phase to which most thoughts are subjected along the way. His blaster hand rose as his mouth opened, a single finger extending to point over the shoulder of the alien even as his mind worked furiously to figure out just what his mouth thought it was doing.

"Look! Bounty hunters! They're coming for the hyperdrive converter!" he shouted, pointing to a pair of strangers walking past the ends of the canards toward the front of the ship.

Against all common sense, even the miniscule modicum of the stuff present in Hibiki's own body at that moment, the massive furred sapient halted in its attempts to pry the ramp open and _turned_ to regard the strangers who, at that point, had taken their own interest in the goings-on near them. At this distraction, Hibiki lowered his shoulder and _charged_ , slamming into the intruder and knocking him off-balance. As the surprised Whipid tumbled out onto the docking pad, Rynar turned once more to the control panel and re-engaged the ramp mechanism, this time grasping the large metallic lever and using the manual gear system to assist in closing it himself.

A few seconds later found him in the _Nomad's_ cockpit, five-point harness haphazardly thrown over his shoulders as the departure process, already begun when the signal from the emergency access remote had opened the ramp, came to a close. The engines warmed up and the weapons and shields drawing power, he ran through the final process himself. The steady, aggressive pounding on the ramp from below stopped, and he assumed the Whipid had given up and backed off when he realized that the light escort freighter was about to take off.

Activity between the forward wings caught his attention, and he paused, his hand on the throttle, as he watched the two strangers he had used as scapegoats earlier draw blasters of their own and open fire on the Whipid, the large sapient taking several hits before turning tail and fleeing with several dark patches of fur smoking on his torso. The two strangers, whom he could see better now as a pair of human women in dark purple long coats, then turned their blasters on the cockpit and opened fire, their shots ricocheting off the now-active deflector shield.

Hibiki cursed and punched the throttle, the _Nomad's Bluff_ lurching skyward with a powerful pulse of her sublight engines, throwing the two women backward in her wake. He pulled back on the control yoke and the light freighter curved upward into the rust-colored dusk of the smuggler's moon, soaring through the lower, then upper, atmosphere and out into the void.

* * *

Rynar input the coordinates for a relatively short jump to the Ithor system into the navicomputer and initiated the jump to hyperspace, the tension in his body disappearing as the brief, sharp whine of the hyperdrive transitioned to the low, soothing hum of lightspeed travel.

 _Speaking of the hyperdrive…_

The wanderer spun his pilot's chair around to view the black cylindrical casing of the hyperdrive energy converter he had tossed into the cargo netting at the back of the cockpit.

"Now, what to do with you?"

There was the obvious answer, of course. He could easily run to the nearest seedy spaceport and sell the damned thing to the first smuggler he met. It would be a quick way to make some easy credits and, after this most recent botched job, he could do with a few extra.

Then there was the other obvious answer. He reached over and picked up the object. Incredibly lightweight for what it was, with a modern universal dataport on the side opposite the holographic display and ports on either flat face of the cylinder for the incoming and outgoing flow of energy from the ship's power supply to the hyperdrive.

Yes, he supposed, this would fit an early-Imperial Remnant-era Corellian light freighter-class hyperdrive quite well.

Decision made, he spun back around in the chair and leaned back. Mentally cataloguing the tools and parts he would need to make the swap, he crossed his hands behind his head and closed his eyes to catch a brief few hours sleep in-transit to his destination.

* * *

 _That's the fourth one in three standard months,_ fumed the irate would-be bounty hunter.

Syn Shalla walked quickly to keep pace with her older sister, Lyra, as the two of them trekked through the busy streets and alleys of Ord Mantell.

 _We wouldn't have even found him if he hadn't yelled at us, either!_

Her inner rantings were interrupted as she collided with something solid. She looked up to see that Lyra had stopped and turned to face her.

"Stop that." The taller woman said, a stern look on her face. Damn, Lyra only had that look when she was going to lecture her.

"Stop what?" shot back Syn, "Getting mad? Being annoyed that some idiot nobody just made us look like idiots? Or maybe limping because I _think that stupid backdraft broke my leg?_ "

"Oh, calm down. Your leg's fine, you probably just sprained something." Lyra rolled her eyes at her sister's melodramatic tendencies. "I mean it. Stop it. All of it."

"Easy for you to say," Syn replied, " **you've** actually captured bounties before. And your leg's not broken."

"No, my leg isn't broken, and neither is yours. Now quit being such a whiner and hurry up. We'll lose him if you don't." Lyra turned and started walking again, faster than before. Syn moved to keep up with her, the throbbing in her right leg flaring up again.

"What do you mean, 'we'll lose him,'" she said, "he already got away!"

"No, he didn't." responded Lyra, "See?" She held up her left arm and pulled back her sleeve, a small holographic representation of a sphere appearing from within. Hovering just outside the sphere was a smaller, strobing dot. As they walked, Syn saw the dot streak off to one side, replaced with a single line and a series of mathematical calculations.

"Is that… a hyperspace vector?" Syn recognized the formulas, but she didn't have enough understanding to understand where they pointed.

"Bingo." affirmed Lyra. "I tagged his freighter with a short-range transmitter before he knocked us over. It can't trace him out of the system, but with that vector we can narrow down the possibilities." Lyra stopped once more and turned to face the building closest to them.

"Now all we need," said the older woman, "is a ship to get us there."


	2. Chapter 2

The Great and Powerful Rynar Hibiki, Planet-Hopping Part Timer

Chapter 2 - Passing in the Night, Or Rather Just Before The Night

Scene breaks or perspective changes denoted with VvvvvvV because this site is fighting my formatting

VvvvvvV

Rynar Hibiki stood in the engine compartment of the Nomad's Bluff admiring his handiwork. Upon arriving in the Ithor system it had taken him a relatively short time to find the supplies he needed to perform the installation among the various ever-present mechanic's shops and scrapyards in and around the spaceport. The fix wasn't pretty, with exposed, jury-rigged wiring hanging off of the new converter and hyperdrive, but he was relatively sure it was done just well enough to not explode.

Probably.

Hibiki lowered himself onto one of the storage crates that littered the decks of the Nomad's Bluff, taking a few moments to collect his somewhat scattered thoughts and reflect on his current situation. He likely wouldn't be able to return to Ord Mantell for a while, what with the bounty undoubtedly placed on his head by his likely rather irate former client and the tendency of bounty hunters to frequent the hive of Black Sun activity. No, he decided, he would stay away from the Bright Jewel system for the foreseeable future. Shame, that, he really did love the food made by some of the street vendors.

The greasy young man took a long drink from his canteen, savoring the cold, metallic-tasting water as it washed from the metal container down his throat.

Fortunately he had made off with enough credits from this last endeavor that, in addition to what he had managed to scrape together on Ord Mantell before taking the job, he had a pretty sizeable amount stashed away aboard his home vessel. Enough, even, to finally afford to fix the rather impressive-looking cannons she sported across her hull. As they sat now, they were little more than intimidating ornaments, decommissioned by the Imperial Remnant before the ship had been stolen or sold to pay war debts. But that was long before he had gotten his hands on her. Even now she was in much better condition than she had been when he'd acquired her from the scrapyard, especially considering she'd hardly been capable of holding an atmosphere before he'd patched up all the holes in her hull and replaced the cockpit transparisteel.

Hibiki scraped a few crumbs out from between a canine and an incisor with a fingernail. Idly, he wondered how it had gotten there, considering his last meal had been before the… rather creatively resolved job on Ord Mantell, and he distinctly remembered brushing his teeth before making his way to the warehouse.

He stood and departed from the engine compartment, mind set on his next course of action. A quick check of the inside pocket of his jacket and he threw the faded yellow garment across his shoulders, covering his form-fitting sleeveless black shirt. The loading ramp of the Nomad's Bluff descended and her stalwart captain disappeared into the busy crowd of a spaceport at midday in search of lunch.

VvvvvvV

Syn Shalla sat, still half-asleep, in the cramped passenger's cabin of a small luxury yacht, though due to the age and evidently hard life the vessel had clearly had it would be stretching it to even call the craft a yacht at all, much less a luxurious one. Her older sister, Lyra, reclined atop the bench seat directly across from her, an old datapad held in front of her face as she examined the security footage they'd bribed the dockworkers on Ord Mantell into providing for them, studying every detail of their target's freighter and face and committing them to memory.

"It's a VCX- class." Said Lyra.

Syn, roused from her near-slumber, turned her attention to Lyra.

"A what?" She asked.

"A VCX-class freighter," Lyra elaborated, "the Remnant used them for a while, but after the Vong war they sort of phased out. They're pretty popular among smugglers. We trained in them when I was in the Academy. They may be a bit older, but it's a solid platform.'

"So do you think you could pick him out from the crowd when we get there?" Asked Syn.

"Definitely," Lyra replied, "and even if I can't, the battery in that transmitter will last at least another four standard days if the manufacturer is to be believed." Lyra tapped her arm for emphasis.

Syn nodded her head, her gaze lingering on the deep, metallic black paint of her sister's prosthetic arm. Not for the first time, her thoughts wandered back a few years to the night Lyra had woken her a few hours before sunrise in their apartment on Bastion, bags in hand, and led her to a small, isolated landing pad with an unmarked shuttle.

Their lives had changed a lot over the next few days, the repercussions of their flight following them still. Moving from planet to planet every few months made it hard to leave any sort of lasting impact on the places they went, and they hadn't had a true home since Bastion. Lyra would say that home is wherever Syn went, but Syn knew it was just as hard on the older woman as it was on her, perhaps even more so. Syn lost a job and a few friends, Lyra left behind an entire life with-

"Syn?" Lyra's voice pierced the younger Shalla's innermost thoughts. "You're staring again."

Syn's eyes snapped back into focus and she felt her face heat up.

"Sorry," she sighed, "I guess I'm still not used to it."

Lyra's face softened into a sympathetic smile, "I know, Syn, I don't exactly make an effort to hide it either." She gestured to the sleeveless white shirt she wore.

"Still, I'm sorry." Syn paused, glancing at the chrono on her wrist. "Shouldn't we be on Ithor by now?"

Lyra's smile widened and she stood, facing the viewport. "Take a look, little Syn, we are."

Syn slid the longcoat she'd been using as a makeshift pillow and blanket to the side and moved to get a better look through the viewport.

The enormous, colorful jungles of Ithor flashed by less than a kilometer below, the vibrant green canopy stretching farther beyond the horizon than Syn dared to imagine. Splashes of purple and pinpricks of orange poked up through the uppermost leaves at irregular intervals, and through the occasional clearing in the trees, massive, multi-legged beasts could be seen slowly meandering from place to place, their destinations hidden beneath the cover of the trees. A dozen kilometers away, a blue-green lake of crystalline water glittered like liquid emerald and sapphire.

"I can see why this place is sacred to the Ithorians," Syn breathed, "it's beautiful."

"They take their conservation efforts very seriously," remarked Lyra, "hunting is outlawed entirely, and any goods produced on-planet or imported from offworld are bound by strict environmental laws." She turned to regard Syn, her smile fading. "Let's pack the coats away. The leather may not be real, but that won't stop anyone from preaching to us."

Syn nodded, lingering by the viewport for just a moment longer and catching a glimpse of the spaceport in the distance before turning to help Lyra stow their belongings for disembarkment.

VvvvvvV

Hibiki tossed the crumpled packaging of his newly-finished lunch toward one of the numerous disposal units littering the common area of the spaceport, taking more care than usual to make sure it actually made it into the unit before continuing.

The Ithorians took their conservation efforts very seriously.

Despite the high level of foot traffic in the areas immediately surrounding the spaceport, this particular port received a much lower volume of space traffic than one might expect, its landing pads and docking bays primarily reserved for droid-piloted vessels and the less-than-legal cargo freighters that could be found at nearly every such establishment across the galaxy.

The way the young mercenary saw it, that made it the perfect place for an old, unassuming light freighter to blend in without attracting too much attention. He might even be able to find a job here, too.

He was distracted, for a moment, by the sounds of another craft's sublight engines flaring overhead as the pilot brought their vessel, an old, expensive-looking luxury craft of some kind, to a rather aggressive stop only a dozen or so meters above the meandering crowds before banking and settling into position at an open docking bay on the other side of the port.

"Idiot," he muttered, "this is supposed to be a low-key landing area, not a stunt show." Idly, he wondered what sort of stunt show one could perform on Ithor. It would be amusing to see just how maneuverable those ancient herdships could be with a skilled, or stupid, enough pilot.

His stomach satiated, for the time being, he made his way through the crowds, heading for the commercial district and the city proper.

I haven't been to Ithor in over a year, he thought, I wonder if old man Gemmet's kicked the bucket yet?

Destination in mind, Hibiki weaved through the mostly-Ithorian populace, making the occasional wrong turn or three as he navigated the winding "streets" of the Ithorian capital.

Massive trees loomed overhead, grown and dominating the skies long before even the parents and grandparents of most everyone below had been born. Rather than clear out their sacred jungles and foliage for the sake of urban sprawl, Ithorian infrastructure was nearly indistinguishable from nature. Those constructs which weren't physically grown out of the ancient wood of the trees were designed and placed such that they complemented their environment rather than dominating it.

Hibiki stopped before the trunk of ole of the older trees in the area, its trunk stretching at least sixty meters in diameter. Gnarled knots encircled transparent windows and doors and thick, above-ground roots formed walkways and overhanging awnings. The only other obvious unnatural indications of civilized presence were the low, red lighting from inside the "building" and the faint, smooth rumble of the Ithorians' approximation of jazz emanating from between the two Wookiee bouncers at the entrance...

But there was only one. Where was the other? The old man's been using those two as bouncers for much longer than he'd owned this specific club. Those two were insepera-

Rynar's body hit the mossy ground with a muffled thud as the Wookiee that brained him began to drag him through the dirt in a most undignified fashion.

VvvvvvV

"You….. old you t…. ot to… im unconscious!"

Hibiki's head swam and the world around him was obscured by such a bright light oh my god who needs a light that bright?

"No, that's not what 'bring him to me' means, you dolt! If I wanted him hurt I would have said so!"

He recognized the powerful bass of an Ithorian's two mouths speaking in their native tongue, and as the bright light faded the world slowly started to come back into focus. A green and orange blur seemed to be yelling at a much larger brown blur.

"You took his blaster, too?" Grumbled green-orange, "That was a gift! Give it back!"

Yeah, you tell him green blur. I like that blaster. It hits way harder than that dumb little hold-out I keep in my boot. Something about the green blur seemed familiar, too, though he couldn't quite place it. What had he been doing? He slowly slid his hands beneath his chest, palms down, and tried to lift himself up.

"No, not to me, to him!" The green-orange blur resolved into a much more defined green, orange, angry Ithorian blur, as he had suspected. A very familiar angry Ithorian blur gesturing toward him. The alien seemed to notice Hibiki's movements and shuffled toward him on old man Ithorian legs.

"Old man Gemmet?" Hibiki slurred, though what came out of his mouth resembled Ithorian speech more than Galactic Basic.

The alien angrily waved the brown blur, now clearly the Wookiee he hadn't seen outside, over to the young human's side and the two gingerly lifted him off his stomach and into a plush chair, though the Wookiee did most of the lifting.

His vision now mostly clear, Rynar took in his surroundings once more. He was in a well lit room, likely in the back of Gemmet's jazz club as he could hear the music even through the thick wood of the door. The walls, ceiling, and floor were all smooth, dark wood, uneven and knotted as though they had been grown into this shape rather than cut.

Which, of course, like the rest of the club, they had.

Hibiki sat in a soft, cushioned chair opposite Gemmet's massive desk, and the old man moved to have a seat in the identical chair on the other side. Hibiki's hands made a cursory check of his person, pausing on the back of his head to feel the hot, growing lump where he'd been struck before checking his jacket and holster. The former still held the remote for the Bluff, but the latter was empty.

"Look, old man, I know it's been a while but you don't have to have me beaten just to say a quick hello. I was already on my way here to see you, so," he turned to regard the cause of his unconsciousness, "can I have my blaster back?"

"Of course, of course. Laawrampa, if you would be so kind as to return his blaster?" Gemmet stared pointedly at the Wookiee.

Laawrampa growled in assent and begrudgingly handed the dazed young man his blaster before saying something in Shyriiwook and ducking through the door and back out into the club.

Rynar wondered if he'd ever even come close to understanding that language. One could only learn so many languages in a galaxy like this, there would always be more you don't understand.

"I must apologize for Rampa's… enthusiasm, my boy." Gemmet rumbled, "You know how those two can get. They're fantastic employees, if a bit overzealous. They do well to keep the undesirables out of this establishment."

"Yeah, right, undesireables…" Hibiki mumbled, again rubbing the back of his head. He glanced around the office once more. "Got anything to drink in here that isn't toxic to humans? Something strong, I could use a little pain relief."

"But of course, young one," said Gemmet, "so long as you can explain to me why I received word of a seventy-thousand-credit bounty on your head moments after my sources notified me of your arrival on our beautiful homeworld." His hands disappeared behind the desk and he withdrew a small crystal glass and a clear bottle full of sparkling orange-and-gold liquid. "I recall you were quite the fan of the sweeter Chiss liquors?"

"Come on, old man, you know I won't turn down a bribe when you bring out the good stuff." The human eagerly accepted the proffered glass. "And I know you've already heard what happened on Ord Mantell. You may have taught me everything I know about keeping my ear to the ground, but I know you didn't teach me everything you know." He downed the first two (human) fingers of Chiss whiskey, savoring the sweet taste and warm burn as the exotic liquor slid down his throat.

"And you should also know that it's dangerous business getting between the Black Sun and their business. I have power here, but outside of this system my protection is limited. I will not shield you from their retribution should they attempt to claim that which they say you've stolen, whatever that may be." Gemmet leaned back in his chair, long, wrinkled fingers steepling in front of him.

"I didn't technically steal it from them, per se," Hibiki threw the rest of the whiskey down his throat and leaned forward to pour another glass, "I stole it from the mechanic that designed it. It's really a remarkably simple concept, I'm amazed modern manufacturers haven't thought of it yet. See, it takes the-"

"Enough," Gemmet held a hand before him, "if I allow you to continue then we'll be here all week. Now," he leaned forward again, "tell me why you've come to see me. If you just wanted to say hello you would have called."

"Ah, well, about that," Rynar finished his second glass of whiskey and gingerly placed the expensive crystal glass on the expensive desk next to the expensive bottle of alien liquor, "I was actually wondering if you could point me toward a job and a trustworthy mechanic…"

VvvvvvV

The mechanic Gemmet had recommended had a shop on the edge of the commercial district, near the border of the spaceport and the industrial district, if it could even be called industrial with all of the factories and production facilities made of wood. She had been a bit hesitant to work on the Nomad's Bluff, considering her owner's young age and the services requested, but once Rynar dropped the old man's name all hesitation vanished and the Twi-Lek woman agreed to take her tools and the necessary parts to the Bluff's dock and get to work immediately.

Finally, he thought as he exited the storefront, maybe next time someone shoots at my ship I can actually shoot back.

Another ten minutes of wandering through the twisting walkways of the commercial district found him walking through the doors of a gentleman's club in the seedier part of town. Rather than the graceful, elegant wood exterior of Gemmet's jazz bar, this appeared to have started life as a warehouse. The dull, gray exterior of the building was haphazardly covered in bright, neon signs advertising the various species of dancers and clientele to whom it catered. There were silhouettes and posters of male and female dancers of a dozen different species, some of which he might have had a hard time identifying had he cared enough to examine them.

The interior of the building looked much the same as the exterior. The large, central area had been marked off and there was a trio of elevated platforms jutting out, surrounded on all sides by mismatched tables and chairs of all shapes and sizes, filled with patrons equally diverse. Poles of obvious function and purpose were scattered across the platforms and dancers of various skill levels were performing on-stage.

The main body of the warehouse was divided into various rooms by a series of makeshift walls that didn't quite reach the ceiling, the largest of which was the central club area. To one side was what appeared to be some sort of VIP area; roughly five meters by seven, it was currently host to three large circular booth-type tables. Two of the tables were occupied by parties of young people, clearly enjoying themselves if the private dancers servicing them were any indication. The third, despite its size, only held two human men, both of whom appeared to be in their late forties or early fifties.

Hibiki briefly considered taking a detour and crashing one of the parties. The dancers may not have interested him, though they were beautiful, but with the sheer amount of alcohol and other mind-altering substances present, not to mention amicable company, he was certain there was some fun to be had.

No, that would have to wait. He could party when he was finished with his business. After all, he did still have some credits left over and, if tonight went as planned, he probably wouldn't miss a few.

Decision made, Rynar quickened his pace, breaking into a run as he charged straight for the bouncer guarding - Bouncing? Surely if he's a bouncer he's bouncing. - the VIP area. The human man reacted, hand darting behind his back for what was surely a hold-out blaster. Rather than attack the larger, stronger man, Hibiki ducked low, weaving smoothly around him and into the cordoned-off area. Reaching the back of the nearly-empty booth, he vaulted over the back and slid cleanly into the seat, his own blaster leveling at the two men across the table.

The commotion drew the attention of the other two parties, who quickly made an effort to resume their festivities as soon as they noticed the weapons.

Guess I won't be joining them later. Thought Rynar, People are so skittish when they're afraid of you, that's no fun.

The bouncer froze, hold-out blaster in-hand, when he saw the rather bulky weapon aimed at his boss, eyes darting between Hibiki and the other two men, unsure of what to do next.

The man on the left panicked, his eyes wide as he stuttered and stammered, demanding to know the meaning of the intrusion. His frothing spittle spattered the barrel of the DeathHammer.

The man on the right calmly reached for the bottle on the table in front of him, pouring a few fingers of the brown liquid into a pair of shot glasses.

"Oh, calm down, Lin, he's not going to shoot you," said the man on the right, "If that was his plan he would have waited until you left and shot you when you were too drunk to realize he was armed."

The man on the left sat in stunned silence.

"Leave," said Right, "we'll finish this discussion tomorrow. Go find a dancer and drink until you forget this even happened."

Left stood ramrod straight and extracted himself from the booth, indignantly scurrying out of the VIP area and into the club proper, past the still-confused bouncer. Right then waved the large man off and he returned, hesitantly, to his post.

"I assume you're not intending to blast me, either?" Right placed one shot glass before himself and slid the other halfway across the table toward Rynar. "Otherwise I might have to have a word with Gemmet about the company he keeps."

Rynar's smile widened and he let his blaster drop forward, hanging limply in his hand by the trigger guard. He laid the weapon on the table and accepted the shot, raising it in a toast before the two men downed the drinks together.

"Did he call you?" Hibiki asked, placing the small glass face-down on the table before him.

"No," replied his host, "but he's the only one who knows about this job and anyone with half a brain in this business knows you've done work for him. You aren't exactly the subtlest person."

"No," said Rynar, "but I get things done, and that seems like the sort of thing a man like Verne Reio looks for in an employee." He gestured to the man before him, emphasizing the point.

Dressed in dark grays and browns, the man before him certainly didn't look the part of the mid-level crime lord. That is, if you didn't notice the old, pre-New Republic Imperial Captain's bars on his collared shirt and the tanned leather pants. On Ithor, those alone would be cause for a stop-and-search by the authorities, and would almost certainly result in the wearer being detained while the origin of the garment was determined. Verne wasn't the type of man to worry, however. Why would he, with at least half of the local authorities on his payroll?

Good thing, too, considering the man was a spice-runner. Hibiki was pretty sure that he had at least a kilo of the stuff on his person at any given time.

Okay, so maybe he did fit the bill if you considered the fact that they were on Ithor, but on any other backwater Rynar wouldn't have even thought twice about the man.

"Very true," Verne chuckled, "though I do tend to try and avoid hiring anyone with as much Black Sun attention as you. Besides," he leaned forward, "I've heard tell that the so-called New Republic is interested in that fancy little toy you stole."

"And if that thing does even half of what I expect it to then the New Republic won't be problem. So," Hibiki poured himself another shot, throwing it back before continuing, "what are you going to pay me to move?"

"I have twelve crates of spice to be delivered to Naboo. Nothing too fancy," the ex-officer's smile faded, all business now, "but the spice will be hidden in the lining of the crates."

"And what's in the actual crates?"

"Traditional Ithorian herbs," Reio said, "they'll help hide any smell that might happen to leak out, so even if there's a faulty seal nobody should notice. You'll pick up the crates a few kilometers south of the settlement at one of my farms, transport them to your ship, then take them straight through customs like any other cargo."

Hibiki raised an eyebrow. "You don't think that'll be too risky?"

"My boy," Reio shook his head, smile returning briefly, "I've been doing this longer than you've been flying. The only risk I'm taking is hiring you. If you don't make a scene there won't be a problem."

"What with my incredible breadth of subtlety and stealth experience." Hibiki deadpanned.

"Yes… well, I suppose-"

"It's a joke,'Captain.' I swear, you Imperials have no sense of humor."

"Yes, well, working under constant threat of strangulation from afar will do that to you." Verne sighed, "Will you take the job? I'll pay six thousand now and fourteen more when you reach Naboo."

"I'm in." And with a final toast, the deal was done.

VvvvvvV

The shadows lengthened as the sun dipped, creeping lower and lower with each standard hour, shrouding the comparatively low buildings of the spaceport in the shadows of the Ithorian forest.

Two figures waited atop one such building, overlooking the pad housing the Nomad's Bluff. The taller of the two wore a dark sleeveless shirt and brown pants, while the shorter was dressed in a white shirt and simple dark jacket with similar pants.

Lyra knelt and held the sleek black prosthetic of her left arm before her, a scaled-down holographic wireframe representation of their surroundings springing from the disguised holoemitter within.

Syn moved to her sister's side.

"Is that mechanic still there?" She asked, peering through the old pair of macrobinoculars she had obtained from a pawn shop on Ord Mantell.

"Yeah," Lyra said, "but it looks like she's packing up. Take a look." She tapped Syn's shoulder to get her attention, then gestured to her own display. The section of the display focusing on the freighter magnified, and three dots appeared on the side of the craft opposite the two women. One dot was steady near the mechanic's landspeeder, but the other two were moving quickly back and forth between it and the Bluff.

"See those two?" Lyra indicated the two active dots.

"Her droids?"

"Yes. I'm betting she'll be out of our way in less than half an hour."

Syn nodded. "Then we move in?"

Lyra smiled. "Then we move in."

VvvvvvV

The deal had been made, and Hibiki had switched quickly from hard liquor to copious amounts of water.

It wouldn't do for his first job with this new client to be performed under the influence. After all, one does not drink and drive, let alone in a client's vehicle loaded with illegal cargo.

That's just inviting attention from law enforcement.

An hour of aggresisve rehydration and sweat-inducing workouts, pull-ups on the bars overhanging the low doors in the warehouse, push-ups on the floor of the VIP lounge, and, much to the owner's chagrin, twenty minutes spent practicing his own pole dancing out on the main stage served to sober him up enough that he felt comfortable driving himself to the farm.

And the tips had been encouraging, too.

The farm hadn't been too far from town, only a few minutes by way of the oversized cargo speeder the ex-Imperial had loaned him for the job, and as he approached the spaceport under the copper skies of the Ithorian "golden hours," for this planet's twilight lasted anywhere from one to three hours depending on the time of year, his eyes scanned the thinning crowds of pilots, crews, and dockhands. He had been given the description of a particular customs officer with loose morals and tight lips, and managed to find the man in question and get his departure papers squared away in short order. The man was as shifty as they came, and Rynar couldn't help but feel on-edge as he waited for the officer to clear his cargo for export.

He pulled the transport away from the customs office and parked it at the foot of the ramp of the Nomad's Bluff, casually hopping down from the elevated cockpit and flicking the little yellow remote in the direction of the vessel, the ramp sliding down with the familiar hiss of high-pressure hydraulics.

Rule number one of being all sneaky-like, he thought, act like you're supposed to be doing whatever you're not supposed to be doing and nobody will question a thing.

Walking around to the back side of the open-bay transport, he opened the rear door and palmed the activation switch on the inside of the door, bringing the two compact loader droids stored among the cargo to life. He quickly directed them to load the containers into the Bluff's cargo bay, then turned to inspect the mechanic's work as they went about following his commands.

The cracks in the housings of the decommissioned and damaged laser cannons at the bow were repaired, near-invisible weld seams speaking to the skill of the mechanic and the quality of her tools. The brackets holding several of the housings in place had been replaced as well, meaning that she had removed the heavy weapons entirely, however briefly, to perform those repairs.

The work, at least from what he could see on the surface, appeared to be solid, so he nodded to himself and strode up the ramp into the freighter.

The two droids made quick work of the loading process and Rynar undid the gunbelt and holster around his hips, laying it atop a tarp-covered speeder bike he'd swindled off of some adrenaline-junkie on some moon or another before dismissing his borrowed mechanical helpers back to the transport, which swiftly rose from the ground and darted off into the city, the autopilot likely on a return course to whatever illicit garage its owner deigned to use for storage.

Removing his jacket and opening the equipment locker at the top of the ramp, he almost didn't hear them, but the tingling sensation at the base of his neck as his hairs stood on end and the nearly-imperceptible whirring of small mechanical servos not native to the Nomad's Bluff, along with the scuffing of lightweight boots on the feet of someone slightly inexperienced with stealthy approaches. He spun, dropping low and ducking under the outstretched arm of the person directly behind him, his open palm striking her in the sternum and shoving her back into the bulkhead with a loud crash. His hand dropped down dipped into his boot, withdrawing the beat up hold-out blaster from within and aiming it square at the face of his assailant-

"Finger off the trigger, kid." came a feminine voice from his right.

Aim holding steady on the face of the young human woman in front of him, his eyes darted to the right and found the familiar barrel of another, larger, blaster centimeters away in the hand of another woman.

"You know," he started, index finger sliding slowly off of the trigger and out of the trigger guard, "it's rude to hold someone up with their own blaster."

"Says the guy that just slammed my sister into a wall." Came the reply, light gray eyes meeting his.

"Ow," Came another voice, this time from the first, younger woman, "first you break my leg, now you break my ribs. I think I'm starting to hate you." She had recovered her footing and was leaning against the bulkhead holding her side and wincing.

"He didn't break your ribs," the older responded, the DeathHammer in her grip wavering slightly, "and you'd know that he didn't break your leg if you would just look at the scan I took on the ride here."

Hibiki noticed those eyes shift toward her sister, then roll.

"Sorry, but I-" he lunged sideways at the older woman, dropping the hold-out and wrapping his hands around his blaster and her wrist, "have a schedule," he planted his feet and pivoted, drawing her arm over his shoulder and putting all of his weight and strength into a disarming throw, "to kee-What the hell?- Oof!"

A thud signaled his own union with the deck of the ship.

The deck was cool on his face, and he had a rather unflattering view of himself in the reflective trim, the solid metal hand of the older woman wrapped around the back of his skull.

Ah, prosthetics. Probably should've noticed that. Super deep paint job on that thing, feels like you could just fall into that black.

"Well," said the older sister, "looks like your schedule just changed. Syn," she turned to the younger sister, "go get our bags, we won't be staying on Ithor tonight."

"On it, Lyra." Hibiki couldn't see above the sisters' knees, but he saw the legs of the younger woman, Syn, walk past and down the ramp.

"So…" Hibiki drawled, "I'm guessing this means I'm not getting my blaster back?"

His hands were wrenched behind his back and bound quickly and expertly with a pair of stun cuffs.

"Can I at least make a comms call? I need to let the old man know I'm going to miss dinner. He promised me he was going to take me out for dessert after, but I know he likes it way more than I ever- mmph!"

A thick metal band clamped over his lower jaw, a hiss of pressurized air escaping the rebreather as it established an airtight seal and muffled any further attempt at speaking.

VvvvvvV

Lyra pulled the fugitive to his feet and pushed him none-too-gently through the halls of the light freighter, following the curve of the craft around until it circled back to the cockpit, her captive's muffled grunts continuing as though he were still speaking, undeterred by either the rebreather or her inability to hear him.

She pushed him down into the seat immediately behind the copilot's seat, withdrawing a length of hardened plasteel fibercord and binding him to the swiveling chair before stepping forward and dropping herself into the pilot's seat.

Ugh, she grimaced, taking in the empty food and drink packages, faded trimwear, and unidentified organic slime that permeated every switch, lever, and crevice of the freighter's controls. How can anyone stand to fly like this, much less live it?

Muffled chuckling filled the cabin as her captive determined the source of her disgust, and she turned to face him.

"Am I going to find any nasty surprises waiting for me when I start her up? Any idiotic, custom firmware or launch prep procedures I should know about?"

"Hmph, mm hmmm hm mph hm. Hm hph mph hm."

She raised an eyebrow and, after a moment, sighed, turning once more to face the console, balling her left hand into a fist and extending a dataport interface from a port in the middle knuckle. She slotted the Intruder probe into the dataport on the console and set about preparing to launch.

She broke through the simple encryption of the password-protected lockout system easily enough, and by the time she had refamiliarized herself with the ex-Imperial craft's controls she caught motion out of the corner of her eye and looked up to see Syn approaching from the direction of the building they'd used for their stakeout, one bag slung over her shoulders and the other in hand. With a wave, the younger Shalla disappeared beneath the canards of the freighter and, seconds later, Lyra heard the pneumatic hiss of the boarding ramp closing beneath her.

A smile lit Lyra's face and she turned once more to face the young man tied up behind her.

"Say goodbye to Ithor, kid, we're taking you stra-"

"Yeah, yeah, straight to the Black Sun. I know what you're after, I saw you on Ord Mantell. I'm not an idiot, bounty hunter." Hibiki sat with a smug look on his face, still restrained, but the rebreather lay in his lap.

"What? How did you-"

"Job on Mon Cala. You pick stuff up fast. Not important." His smile disappeared and his face hardened. "Look, are we taking off or not? I need to know how to plan my brilliant escape."

Before Lyra could respond, Syn strode into the cabin, minus their luggage, mood noticeably improved from before, and shoved the rebreather back where it belonged.

"Come on, Lyra," Syn lounged back in the copilot's chair, "let's turn in a bounty."

Lyra paused, glancing between the other two occupants of the cabin.

She raised her left hand toward the ship's former captain, whose eyes went wide as a panel slid open in her palm. Before he could react, however a pair of spheres shot out, a wire stretched between them, and wrapped themselves around his body, further restraining him and securing him to his chair.

"Mmph? Mph mm mmh mphm-"

Lyra smiled, squeezing her hand into a fist, and a not-insignificant amount of electricity surged through the wire and into their captive. His body seized up, shuddered, and finally went still, unconscious.

VvvvvvV

Syn looked at her sister's handiwork- No, stop, no more hand puns.-then back to Lyra as she finished the final preparations and pulsed the craft's sublight engines, lifting them into the air.

She reached into the inner pocket of the jacket she had retrieved from their luggage and pulled out a datapad, opening the holobook she had started on the trip from Ord Mantell, reveling in her first successful bounty capture.

Okay, so maybe she got her ass handed to her, but only a little! Lyra hadn't done ALL of the work. After all, Syn had chosen their stakeout location.

Yes, today was a good day. Now all they had to do was return the mark to their Black Sun contact along with whatever it was he stole, and Lyra said that she found it bolted onto the hyperdrive, so they were all set there, too.

She immersed herself in her holobook, revelling in tales of fantastic primitive beings with mystical powers embarking on incredible adventures.

Neither Syn nor Lyra noticed the momentary flash of the sensor anomaly detected off the ship's prow, hidden behind one of the lush planet's barren moons. A brief flicker, and it was gone.


End file.
